


Fix It

by thebravelittlemonkey



Category: Agents of S.H.I.E.L.D. (TV)
Genre: Episode Related, Episode: s01e06 FZZT, F/M, Gen, Lab Bromance
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-10-26
Updated: 2013-11-09
Packaged: 2017-12-31 23:15:46
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 3
Words: 5,458
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/1037557
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/thebravelittlemonkey/pseuds/thebravelittlemonkey
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>The two scientists sat against the glass in wait. But they were waiting for two very different things. Fitz for a solution and Simmons for her cue.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Simmons

**Author's Note:**

> This is my Episode 6 promo interpretation, originally posted to tumblr (thebravelittlemonkey.tumblr.com) two weeks ago. FZZT is out now, and of course more glorious than my fic could ever be, but I'm still pretty proud of this one, so I'm putting it up here for you all! There has been very little editing since the initial post, so all similarities to the actual episode are coincidental.

Staring ahead at the cargo bay doors, Simmons had never been more terrified in her life.

The biochemist didn’t like absolutes. There was no always and never in science, and scientists who thought so were naive in her opinion. Fitz didn’t believe in absolutes, even though he used them quite a bit. ‘We’ll _never_ finish this in two hours’ or ‘you _always_ steal the last fortune cookie.’ Jemma was more careful with her words though; they were important to her and exaggerations cheapened them.

All the same, she decided, there was a time for absolutes.

She had _never_ been more terrified in her life.

The cool glass against her back did nothing to soothe her nerves and she sorely wished it wasn’t there at all. She could use a reassuring pat from the boy behind that glass, the one who was mirroring her stance with his back pressed against hers. The one who was still half-heartedly rambling through equations as if they could fix this, whatever _this_ was.

This was complicated.

This was a problem they had never combatted before, and so complex, even the resident geniuses were stumped by it. It’s how they had ended up here, slumped against the glass in defeat. An hour before they had been pacing, thinking, and inventing. Brainstorming and talking, or shouting really. The glass made conversation more difficult than normal, but the two didn’t really need to hear one another to understand.  But what they needed to understand was _this_.

Somehow it had gotten hold of her. The thing, the this. They didn’t know what to call it: infection, marking, tethering. The unseen force had latched onto her during the last autopsy and the killer could still be thousands of miles below them. There was no way to stop it. _This_ was going to kill her.

They did know a few things though. Whoever or whatever was attacking was also watching. Watching and waiting. The last victim had been ‘marked’ for hours before death, and the killer had waited until the team arrived to do it. It knew and it was playing with them. Once it was clear the victim was dead, it would latch onto another one. This time, to Simmons. 

So now the two scientists sat in wait. But they were waiting for two very different things. Fitz for a solution and Simmons for her cue.

Aside from May, they were the only ones on the Bus. At first, it had been a test of distance, to see if they could simply outrun the problem while the rest of the team investigated from below. When that didn’t work, it became their quarantine. Fitz had hated the word the minute Coulson mentioned it over the coms. Quarantine was what they did when the victims died, and Simmons was still very much alive thank you. Despite continued orders to separate and avoid a second ‘infection,’ Fitz refused. They had work to do; if they just gave them some time they could figure this out.

Finally Simmons had stepped in, sealing the lab from the outside on the pretense of going to the bathroom. When his look of betrayal subsided, they continued their work from across the glass.

But now, they had run out of work.

“We still need to look into this floating bit. It’s not a side effect, I’m telling you. It’s more than that…”

While Fitz continued to look for an answer, Simmons only nodded in agreement, knowing that there already was one.

Less than ten minutes ago, Coulson’s voice had come through crisp and clear on her comm, beginning with the phrase ‘do not tell Fitz.’ The rest of the instructions had been significantly more complicated, but it was the first one she found most difficult to follow.

Not telling the plan to Fitz felt too much like lying. She was a terrible liar and he was the last person she would lie to, the last person she _could_ lie to. You couldn’t lie to yourself, right?

But here she was, trying to remember how a thirty thousand foot free fall was supposed to counteract death rather than cause it. There had been plenty of reassuring words, an explanation about how May was getting into a position safe from jet streams and high winds, how Ward would be there to ‘catch’ her somehow, and how Skye would track her position the whole time. It all sounded so simple coming out of Coulson’s calm voice, but it didn’t stop the sinking feeling in her gut.

She was terrified, and it wasn’t for the impending plunge.

She was terrified of leaving the boy on the other side of the glass who wouldn’t stop talking. Of figuring out what in the world to say to him to make this okay. If all went according to plan, he’d think she was dead for twenty minutes, and that was the point. It had to be believable, and his grief would be their proof. It was cruel, but necessary. Now it was up to Simmons to find a way to let his world fall apart for a moment, but keep him together. And if all didn’t go according to plan, well, she just needed to pick her words wisely.

“What if there isn’t a solution?” she prodded cautiously, still trying to sort out her mental speech.

“…cross reference it with- what? No, of course there’s a solution. There’s always a solution. We just need to look into the gravitational shift, I’m telling you if we could track—”

“But what if there’s—”

“No, if we could just track the shift in gravity, and see how often there’s…”

“But Fitz—”

“…a change in force we could..”

“There are—”

“…look into the density of—”

“Fitz!” 

She spun around to face him in an effort to wrestle control of the conversation away. He turned around as well, ready to launch into another set of theories, but she quickly cut him off.

“There isn’t _always_ a solution, Fitz. Just like the number of leukocytes doesn’t _always_ indicate disease or the new night-night gun doesn’t _always_ fire properly. Even gravity doesn’t _always_ apply! Sometimes things—”

“Just because it’s been altered doesn’t mean it doesn’t apply…” he interrupted, looking offended by her breach of scientific law.

“That’s not the point, you—”

“And the new night-night gun will _always_ fire when I fix it,” he continued.

“Oh come on you know that’s not true,”

“Of course it is!”

“The last set of bullets shattered into—”

“Yes but I’ll fix it and—”

“Fitz you can’t always fix it!” she shouted, trying desperately to break through the wall of nonsense that was filling the place where something important needed to go. She needed him to listen for one minute, but she hadn’t realized the impact of her last statement until it was left hanging in the silence that followed. He was finally listening to her, but this wasn’t what she wanted him to hear. Before she could backtrack, Coulson’s voice alerted her to the two minute count down and she panicked.

This was all wrong. No no no, this wasn’t what she wanted at all. She wasn’t supposed to leave like this; this wasn’t the speech she wanted to give. She hadn’t even come up with the speech, but she knew it was there somewhere, right? You always had those things, the things that really mattered to the people you really cared about  stored up in a secret place. Your thank you, your goodbye, your speech. She just needed to pause, make the incessant countdown in her ear stop and find it.

But Fitz already seemed out of reach, sulking off to his lab bench to jot down the theories she had refused to listen to. The countdown continued coming in her ear. The timing had to be perfect. 90 seconds left.

“I’m sorry, Fitz,” she began, getting to her feet while he continued to keep his head down in a childish display of annoyance. 

“You’re right, you can. You can always fix things,” she continued, letting the words fall out without thinking. This wasn’t the speech, but it would have to do. His pencil had stopped moving, but he stayed at the bench.

“Do you remember what I said about Sneezy? Beyond repair! Can’t do it. Not after a pure energy ray fried all of the hardware,” she laughed, somewhat hysterically, as she tried to keep her composure. 60 seconds.

“But you did it. You fixed him, hardware and all, good as new. You always figure it out, even when I give up. You always fix things.” She stopped as her voice caught in her throat. Fitz had abandoned his notes at this point and was moving away from the bench with a look of concern. Why? Oh, she was crying. When did that happen?

“You’ll find a way to fix this,” she managed, pulling a weak smile as she backed away from the glass. It was a small hint, a small condolence, but it was all she could afford. Fitz was shouting back to her now, aggressively pointing to some spot over her shoulder, but she couldn’t hear him over the roar of the wind. Oh.

30 seconds.

He was truly shouting now, yelling and pantomiming how to pull the emergency cargo lock, but Simmons just kept backing away. It seemed to click for him all at once, and she saw him dive for the lab door handle. He looked so desperate, so shattered, that she had to turn away.

10 seconds. 

She took another step towards the now open door, and looked out, finally allowing herself the feel the fear and doubt she had so naively ignored before. Catch her? God this was never going to work.

Maybe that really was her speech. Her goodbye. He deserved something better, but it was too late.

3

2

1


	2. Fitz

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The two scientists sat against the glass in wait. But they were waiting for two very different things. Fitz for a solution and Simmons for her cue.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Side note....I have literally no idea how AO3 works, so I apologize here in Chapter 2, for any ridiculous mistakes or breaches in AO3 etiquette. This is probably my favorite of the three chapters, but I think that's because I have a giant soft spot for Fitz. Poor baby.

There were a lot of days when Fitz questioned why he was in the field. He’d been opposed to it from the start and his list of complaints was well rehearsed and, in Simmons’ opinion, worn-out. He just wasn’t built for fieldwork. It was the exact opposite from what he preferred; it was chaos, mess, and danger. He was meticulous, safe, and socially…limited. He liked when his world could be confined by four walls covered in white boards and computer screens, and when the only human contact required was with someone who at least spoke his language. 

Simmons made it easier to pretend the world was still small. Some days they would lose themselves in new projects and research, talking and drawing and building until the rest of the chaos melted away, and all that was left were their four glass walls. Their own little world. A world where he could still have some sense of control, some ability to keep a handle on everything that was happening. Some days he even enjoyed it, and recently, those days were happening more often. Still, some days he questioned it.

Today was one of those days.

Today the glass walls weren’t a comfort; they were a prison. A barrier that kept him from the outside world he, for once, so desperately wanted to get to. Not for long of course, just long enough to rescue the girl on the other side of the glass who had stopped talking. To bring her back into their safe space where they could talk and draw and build their way out of the latest disaster he called fieldwork. But he couldn’t reach her through the glass, and he had a sinking feeling that she didn’t even want to be reached.

He’d missed it at first, the moment where the fight went out of her. One minute their sentences were running together in a frenzy of brainstorming, and the next, she was nodding along to his every insane theory without so much as a sarcastic quip. He tried to keep her going, prodding at her area of expertise, even divulging in the alien theories she loved so much. After ten minutes, even he started to lose faith.

Then the arguing began.

Bickering was their natural state of being at times, but not like this. This wasn’t constructive, it was completely nonsensical. And then it was personal.

“Fitz you can’t always fix it!”

Maybe it was the timing. Maybe it was the way she said it or the words themselves that dug deep into his confidence. Maybe it was because Simmons was _dying_ and fixing it was the only option he would accept. Maybe it was all of these things or none of them, but the moment the words came out of her mouth, the fight went out of him, too.

Simmons of all people knew fixing things was his _job_. It was the very definition of what an engineer was. It’s what drove him, excited him, and kept him coming back to this damn field work even when it scared him senseless. If he couldn’t solve a problem then what was he good for? And more importantly, if Simmons didn’t believe he could solve a problem, then why had she been working with him for all these years? For this? For his great moment of failure to be her death?

He wouldn’t accept defeat, so he retreated to his work station, clinging to his last bit of security in the form of a notebook and pen. He scratched away uselessly on the paper,  placing so much effort into ignoring Simmons that he didn’t even know what he was writing. Numbers. Useless, pointless numbers that he couldn’t will into a solution. It was his final exam and he was failing it, crumbling under the pressure and he was furious. Furious at Simmons for giving up. Furious at the idiot who was doing this. Furious at himself for not being good enough to stop it. The numbers were practically illegible now, but he kept writing. 

“I’m sorry, Fitz.”

He refused to look up at her. If she was going to bail, fine, but he had work to do and the least she could do was leave him in peace. Despite his determination to ignore her, he lost his resolve to be angry with her almost instantly. Just like he always did. But this time something was different. Her voice seemed stilted, hitching suddenly at the end of a sentence or a word, and when he finally looked up at her, he saw her eyes ringed with red. 

“You always fix things.”

Something was wrong. Something was definitely wrong. He knew Simmons, possibly better than he knew himself at this point, and she didn’t talk like this. She hated admitting he was right, she hated ‘always,’ and he’d never seen her cry without an animated film playing in the background. As he moved towards her, she pulled back, like a magnet that had somehow been flipped the wrong way. And that’s when he noticed it.

The cargo door was opening, slowly pulling open a window to the blue skies behind them that Simmons was approaching with alarming speed. His panicked voice broadcasted over the comms. 

“May! May close the door, the cargo door’s opening. You’ve got to—Simmons, Simmons don’t back up!” He waved to her frantically but she seemed oblivious.

“You’ll find a way to fix this.” Her voice was apologetic somehow and his mind couldn’t process it all in time.

“The cargo lock! Simmons hit the cargo door lock!” he shouted, banging on the glass to get her attention but she didn’t seem to hear him. She just kept looking at him with that sad smile and taking small, hesitating steps backwards. What was she _doing?_

“The lock! Jemma, for God’s sake _the lock_!” 

Then it hit him. She knew what she was doing. This was no accident, this was a plan. The distance wasn’t far enough, the quarantine wasn’t safe enough, and the team hadn’t found an answer. This was it; this was their new solution, the new quarantine. All logic left him in an instant and he lunged for the door that he knew was locked.

“NO!” 

He was screaming. He couldn’t tell over the roar of the wind, but the demand ripped through his throat painfully as he yanked with all his strength on the door handle. She was turning away; he was losing her. God he was losing her.

“JEMMA STOP! Please, please just—we can fix this,” he begged, slamming a fist against the glass pane that wouldn’t even grace him with a crack. She was nearly there, nearly gone forever. He yelled with incoherent rage as he threw his whole body weight back against the handle. She was so close; just one more step.

“No, no—NO!” he screamed and he didn’t stop. He screamed until the wind sucked out his voice like it had sucked out the girl on the other side of the glass. His fingernails scraped against the door as if he could somehow grab onto her, to stop her body from falling over the edge, to hold on to some little piece of her, but there was nothing left. 

She was gone.

The realization didn’t hit him. His brain wouldn’t allow it to so it simply shut down instead. Everything stopped. His screaming, his clawing, his thinking. He just froze, staring blankly ahead at the space where something unspeakable had happened. The place where something was missing. 

He wasn’t aware of sitting, but suddenly he was on the floor. His limbs felt too stiff and something clenched painfully in his chest, but his mind could barely register the feeling. He couldn’t move, couldn’t speak. A broken robot without a power source. 

He was completely empty. Someone had ripped out all of the important bits; all of the wiring and cabling were gone. There was just enough left inside to sit here, to sit and stare at the place where something was missing. 

The rest of world was still moving around him in a way that didn’t make sense. The cargo doors were retracting, the plane was tilting down in a descent, and something was buzzing in his ear. Someone was talking to him. A female voice alerting him in brief commands that he couldn’t understand. A voice that wasn’t hers.

_“Agent Fitz, respond….respond Agent—”_

The small communication device was at his feet now. He must have ripped it out. He couldn’t recall.

The silence was suffocating, but he didn’t feel like he was breathing anyways. It was safer this way, the silence. He knew he couldn’t hear it, couldn’t hear one of them say it. The cold, somber announcement would shatter him, break down his last thin barrier of ignorance and leave him a sobbing mess on the floor.  

The tears didn’t come though. He expected them to—he almost wanted them to—but they didn’t. Some part of him knew she was gone, and that part of him knew he should be crying.  She deserved tears, but he couldn’t even do that. He was too damn empty.

There was nothing left.  It was just him now, alone in these four glass walls. There was no control, no safety. No way to fix it.

Their little world was gone.


	3. Fitzsimmons

**Summary for the Chapter:**

> The two scientists sat against the glass in wait. But they were waiting for two very different things. Fitz for a solution and Simmons for her cue.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> And the final chapter ^_^ Hope you all enjoy. I love getting feedback and constructive criticism so feel free to drop me a comment or a message. Can you message people on this? Still confused about AO3....I'm like Chris Evans on Twitter. Anyways, enjoy!

Her first thought was simple: _I’m not dead_.

Her next few thoughts related to the equation for terminal velocity, the alveolar–arterial gradient, and whether or not she had indeed peed herself. But that first thought kept repeating in her head like a mantra. I’m not dead. I’m not dead. _I’m not dead._ It still didn’t seem believable even after she confirmed it for the twentieth time. The idea was just too impossible to entertain.

Yet here she was, gracefully floating down towards a swath of green earth that grew bigger every second. Behind her, Ward gently adjusted their course by pulling on the right parachute string. He was outfitted in a complex array of gear that looked suspiciously like Stark Tech. The kind of Stark Tech that wasn’t sold to the public or even sold at all for that matter. The propulsion boots rested uncomfortably on either side of her knees, but she wasn’t complaining. Those things had saved her life, those and the rest of the team that had somehow executed this insane plan.

“And you’re sure you’re feeling all right?” Ward asked again, tightening the strap tethering her to his own harness.

“Yes, I’m pretty sure. Though perhaps we could talk about this when we aren’t falling out of the sky?” she suggested, shouting as politely as she could manage over the rushing air. She was eternally grateful to Ward for his daring mid-air rescue, but he seemed to forget the part where she wasn’t a Black Ops Specialist who jumped out of planes on a regular basis.

“Right,” he replied awkwardly, “Don’t forget to tuck your legs up.”

* * *

When they landed, Coulson had a heart monitor on her before Ward could even unstrap her from the harness. Skye hovered next to him, receiving the information on a small, hand-held device and ticking off a list of items to ensure she really was ‘infection’ free. While they poked and prodded at her with medical scanners, Coulson filled the air with the details of their plan. 

“…and you two were onto something with the gravity question. Turns out Dr. Hall was our missing link,” he continued. “Then the trick was just imitating the last few victims.”

“I don’t recall his victims jumping out of planes,” Simmons piped in skeptically.

“No, but they did end up suspended, weightless in the air. This was the best way to replicate that,” Coulson replied. Seeing the height of Simmons’ eyebrows he quickly added “On short notice that is. You did say you wanted something to spice up the lab work, didn’t you?”

“Yes well, this certainly is a change of pace,” she replied, always the optimist but still breathless from the whole ordeal. 

“Aaannnnnnd…..she’s safe!” Skye announced, looking up from the medical data stream with an ear to ear grin. “Holy shit that actually worked!” she added with an incredulous laugh. Simmons felt the tightness in her chest loosen as Ward gave her a proud pat on the back and Skye doled out high fives to whoever would take them. Not even Coulson could conceal a satisfied smile.

“So how does it feel to fake your own death?” he asked, leaving something unsaid between his words.

“Awful!” she admitted, feeling utterly exhausted from the purge of emotions she had just endured over the last hour. A knot still twisted in her stomach, unresolved even by the success of the mission.

“Well maybe next time you can take a little time off in Tahiti,” he offered.

“That’s quite all right, once was enough for me,” she replied, unable to imagine suffering through this experience again. She never wanted to give that speech again. Never wanted to watch Leo’s features contort in helpless desperation again. She wondered if Coulson had seen their faces, if he had seen the Avengers in his last moments on the Hellicarrier. If he’d been forced to watch as they pounded against the glass that wouldn’t break, helpless to save him. Maybe he had a speech too; it was probably much better than hers. As he gave her a sympathetic nod, she decided it didn’t really matter; you should only have to say goodbye once.

“All right let’s pack up and get moving. We rendezvous with the Bus in five,” Coulson announced, breaking Simmons out of her thoughts and setting Ward and Skye into motion. Within minutes the gear was packed into their sleek, black van and Coulson was at the wheel, relaying coordinates to May.

“So, they’re both all right, May and Fitz, that is?” Simmons asked quietly, looking to Skye who shared the backseat with her.

“Oh yeah, I mean, nothing like a little gravity is going to mess with the Cavalry. And Fitz is…well he’s…” Skye trailed off, trying to find the right words to explain the situation.

“Fitz is what? Oh God he’s not infected is he?” she asked, jumping to the worst conclusion almost immediately.

“No no! No he’s fine, he’s just…”

“He’s not responding to his comms,” Ward finished matter-of-factly. “May has eyes on him though, she’s confirmed he’s safe.”

“Turns out your performance was a bit _too_ convincing, Agent Simmons. I don’t think he took too kindly to the idea of you dying,” Coulson explained. “None of us would.”

* * *

 

Simmons got to him first. No one tried to stop her when she bolted from the van and up the cargo ramp.  She may have trusted Melinda with her life, but she still needed to confirm he was alive with her own eyes. The day had given her a rather irrational fear of sudden death, or perhaps a very rational one. Regardless, she just needed to see him, to fit the pieces back together.

If it hadn’t been for Coulson’s insistence that Fitz was in fact alive and well, she may have thought otherwise when she arrived at the lab doors. The crumpled heap on the floor didn’t look alive, not in the least. Not the blank eyes or the unmoving gaze. Not the unnatural way his knees knocked together in front of his limp body. Not his vacant, empty expression. Not a single part of him looked alive and well.  His pathetic form didn’t even stir as she hastily punched in the code for the door lock; there was no reaction to the soft pressured hiss as the door slid open, and when she stepped into the lab, Simmons couldn’t help but remember her own words: _You can’t always fix things._  

“Oh Fitz!” The exclamation of pity seemed to rouse him from his catatonic stupor, her voice pulling him back to reality as he turned to meet her gaze.

“Simmons…?” he sputtered, eyes wide in disbelief as he tried to take in the mirage in front of him. For a moment, he was frozen in shock, gaping up at her from the floor with a dumbfounded expression that didn’t suit the face of a young genius. His lifeless form was suddenly filled with energy, and he scrambled to his feet, rushing over to her with a single-minded determination to touch her, to somehow disprove the illusion of her appearance. He grasped her shoulders and held her at arms length with the same slack-jawed expression of confusion as he searched her face for proof that she was real.

She waited for him to say something, to shout something, to yell. To shake her and scream at her for not telling him, for lying to him and leaving him here, alone and broken. She waited for the tirade, the one she deserved because _god_ look what she had done to him. She didn’t even know where to start, but one of them had to.

“Fitz I’m so sorry I should have—” The apology that would surely have no end was suddenly cut off as Simmons found herself in an embrace so tight, it seemed as if Fitz was clinging to life itself. Wrapping her arms around her other half, she decided apologies could wait.

* * *

And suddenly there they were: the tears.

He wasn’t sure if they were tears of joy or the stored up tears of grief he hadn’t been able to shed, but they were pouring out of him and he hadn’t the slightest clue how to make them stop. Thank god she was shorter than him, he thought, wondering if he could keep his head buried in her shoulder forever, or at least until the faucet turned off. He tried to concentrate on the feel of something solid in his arms, some _one_ solid, coming to terms with Simmons’ death and life all in one moment. A moment that was in a word, overwhelming.

_She’s not dead._

The thought seemed impossible so he kept repeating it to himself. She’s not dead. She’s not dead. _She’s not dead._ It wasn’t until now, twisting his fingers into the soft cotton of her blouse, remembering the smell of iodine mixed with flowered perfume, that he could comprehend what he had almost lost. He listened to the rushed English tone, repeating apologies in his ear and felt the world come back to him. He felt the pieces fall together and he clung to them desperately.

The sniffling in his left ear reassured him that he wasn’t the only one making a fool of himself, so he indulged in a moment of comfort, letting Jemma rub soothing circles into his back while she tired herself out of sorries. He didn’t know why she was apologizing, but he didn’t trust his voice enough to make her stop. When he did finally try it out, it was so hoarse it sounded foreign.

“You jumped out of a plane.”

“I know.”

“From thirty thousand feet.”

“I know.”

“You could have-”

“I know.”

The silence hung in the air for a moment as they both buried the thought away. A hypothesis that had been proven wrong. To be recorded, but never validated.

“Kind of tossed Kahneman’s risk prospect theory out the window there,” he suggested, untwining his stiff fingers from the white fabric and stepping back to look at her.

“Literally,” she replied, lingering her touch on the crook of his elbow as they parted.

A laugh escaped where a sob should have been and they both took the opportunity to wipe their eyes and pretend they were less fragile than they were. Skye was wandering over now, feigning ignorance to the tearful scene in front of her as she typed idly at her phone.

“It was your theory you know. The gravity bit; you figured it out,” Simmons said, trying and failing to put something meaningful into words, but Fitz understood. They had fixed it, just like they always did.  


“Of course I did. We did,” he added in a rare moment of humility. “Though I think you may have taken the gravity part a bit _too_ literally.”

“Oh that was Ward’s idea!” Skye corrected, happily jumping into the conversation as she grabbed Fitz’s shoulder in a quick side hug.

“Well that explains it,” he scoffed, rolling his eyes at the elementary logic. Realizing he should be offended, Ward spun around from where he was pulling off the last of his sky diving suit.

“Hey!”

Skye tried to stifle a laugh as Ward marched over to defend his brilliance. And once again, the lab was full of commotion. Somewhere between the bickering and snark, small moments of sincerity were exchanged. Quiet words of gratitude and heartfelt embraces. A small black comm placed in an open palm. A genuine smile and a knowing look. A white lab coat placed on the back of her chair.

And a new case of beers brought out from the fridge.

* * *

Resting against the cool metal wall, Agent May watched the reunion with a mix of exasperation and reluctant fondness. There was something endearing about the kids, a like-ability that was only outweighed by their alarmingly inexperience and naivety. She had been right to question their lack of field training; the tears were proof of that. But as Coulson approached her side, she graciously decided that now was not the time for I told-you-so’s. His expression masked guilt with pride and pride with composure, a useless exercise in performance that was lost on a top field agent, even more so on a friend.

“Jealous?” she asked in an even tone, keeping her eyes on their younger team members.

“Well I do love a bit of sky diving now and again,” he responded, getting a nostalgic look in his eyes that promised a story.

“You know what I mean,” she returned, giving him a sidelong glance before returning her attention to the lab. They both looked on from the other side of the glass as the four celebrated the unlikely success of the day. They toasted to victory, to themselves, and to Simmons. They basked in the celebration of her life, a life that wasn’t level seven classified.

“I would still love to get that signature,” Coulson replied, in a tone of levity not fitting the weight of the matter. “But a good magician never reveals his secret,” he finished, dismissing the moment as he turned for the door. 

“Not too soon that is,” he added eyes lingering by the storage door for just a second longer. May followed his gaze and let a rare, half smile grace her lips. 

Under the storage door, a pair of propulsion boots lay discarded on their sides. Printed neatly upon the bottom of each were two words:  Stark Industries.


End file.
